Shoreacres voters take new direction, ousting incumbent council members

I rarely write about my little home city of Shoreacres because I live here and people get mighty upset when I say something they don’t agree with. But Saturday’s election is an example of what happens when incumbent politicians either do not listen to the citizens or are perceived as not listening to the citizens.

The way elections work in our city is that all seats are “at-large” and the top vote-getters for however many seats are on the ballot win. In Saturday’s elections, there were three seats on the ballot and nine candidates. Two of the candidates were long-time incumbents, Richard Adams and Dana Woodruff. The third incumbent, Connie Ramirez, chose not to seek re-election.

In the largest voter turnout since I moved here in 2001, the incumbents were blown out. The new council members are Rick Moses, Nancy Schnell, and Bo Bunker. Their election spells trouble for the Mayor, Dolly Arons, and long-time city administrator David Stall.

Financially, Shoreacres is doing “okay”, although there are many improvements that need to be made. We do not have a commercial base, so the financial burden for city services falls almost entirely on the property owners. As such, our tax rate is the highest in the area, by far. For example, we pay about 19% more in property taxes than our neighbors in La Porte, about 27% more than our Seabrook neighbors, and about 43% more than our neighbors in Pasadena. And services other cities take for granted do not exist (animal control) or are, in the case of our emergency medical response, third-rate. But we have traded that for the general peace and quiet of living in a small town, neighbors helping neighbors, etc.

The issues were more of what I term “soft” issues. Typically, when citizens get angry and oust incumbents, there will be some controversy or another that people can focus on but in this case, it was more about the perceived “arrogance” of Mr. Stall and the lack of control that the outgoing council had on the management of the city. Stock answers to citizen complaints and inaction on even small requests are the norm and I guess the citizens just had enough of it. If you pay for the benefits of living in a small town, you want what you pay for.

So now we have a new council and I suspect there will be attempts made to replace Mr. Stall. At the very least, the new council will have him on a very short leash. The total council consists of the mayor and five aldermen. One of the two remaining aldermen, Matt Webber, has already shown signs of frustration with the way the city has been run and I suspect that he will side with the three newcomers. I hope that the new council elects Mr. Webber as the Mayor Pro-tem because he now has experience under his belt and has been the only council member that I’ve seen that comes prepared to meetings with notes and questions. So he gets my support for that job. But best of luck to whomever they choose.

As for the new officeholders, candidates in big city elections could learn a lot about hard work from one of them, Nancy Schnell. Nancy earned my vote and my wife’s vote by working her tail off. She was the ONLY one of the nine candidates to actually ask us to vote for her. She worked tirelessly, visiting every single house in the city and asking for their vote. I know she did this because she showed me her map, where she had highlighted every house and had marks where the people had allowed her to put signs out. She was also at every council meeting but one this year, challenging council to listen to the citizens, to no avail. In addition, she put signs up all around the city on Friday night, signs that read simply “Vote Today”. Kudos to her for her hard work and helping to increase the turnout.

Although they lost the election, I think it is important to recognize Richard and Dana for the countless hours of volunteer work that they have put in for the citizens of Shoreacres over the years. They have much to be proud of, regardless of the perceptions or complaints from voters this year: they were at the helm and helped the city through the disaster of Hurricane Ike and the recovery efforts since then. Our property values are stabilized and even increasing now, we have new homes being built again, and our neighborhood is no longer a “buyers” market. So from this citizen to Richard and Dana, thank you.

And to Bo Bunker, Rick Moses, and Nancy Schnell, congratulations. Your work is just now beginning. And I’ll be watching you and expect that you will fulfill your campaign promises. Good luck!